Leemisa Thuseho

LESOTHO national women’s senior team defender and LDF Ladies veteran ‘Mamoruti Ntsiki has announced her retirement from competitive football to pursue refereeing.

Ntsiki, who was registered with LDF for the yet to start 2020/21 season, confirmed her retirement to the Sunday Express on Friday. She said her decision was influenced by her long-term knee injury.

“Yes, I have retired from competitive football,” Ntsiki said.

“The first reason is my long-term knee injury and the second one is the apparent lack of female referees in the country. Currently, we have only three active female central referees. Therefore, I want to be the fourth one,” she said.

Ntsiki, who is turning 32 this year, said her desire to join refereeing started in 2019 when she took a basic refereeing course.

“I did refereeing basic course in 2019 and this year I will officially start my refereeing journey once I am given that opportunity. Early this month I went for national referees’ fitness test and I passed.

“I am ready for the new journey and I think it will be huge challenge for me because I used to officiate in our inter companies’ tournaments at LDF. That little experience will help.”

Ntsiki, who is also a soldier, was introduced to competitive football in 1999 when she started playing for Likhosatsana Ladies which later became LDF Ladies in 2016.

“I started off as a striker and was later converted to a defender in 2006,” she said.

Ntsiki played for the national team from 2015 until last year when she was part of the team that represented Lesotho in the 2020 Women COSAFA championship in Port Elizabeth.

She said she was happy with her accomplishments having won the Women’s Super League (WSL) title with Likhosatsana in 2016. She was also part of the LDF team that has been dominating the WSL winning four league titles and two Top4 trophies. She was also named the 2017/18 defender of the season.